Toyota has confirmed that it will reveal not one, not two, but three stunning new sports coupes on 5 December in a live-streamed event.
Hang on, three new coupes?
Yes, and they're all cars we've been waiting for for quite some time. The first and potentially most exciting one is Toyota's new GR GT, which is essentially a road-going racing car, developed from a new GT3-spec racer that will be entered in global racing series next year. Both road and competition versions were shown off at the Goodwood Festival Of Speed, under heavy camouflage, by Haas F1 drivers Oliver Bearman and Esteban Ocon (Toyota has a tech-sharing agreement with Haas…).
What do we know about the GR GT so far?
Precious little, only that it will be V8-engined, and that engine will be mounted in the front. Consider this, then, Toyota's answer to the Mercedes AMG GT and the Porsche 911. That V8 will almost certainly be turbocharged (which works better with GT3 racing regulations), but hybrid assistance for a naturally-aspirated unit certainly hasn't been ruled out yet.
Expect to see lots of carbon-fibre and aluminium bits, and the proportions that we've seen on the disguised versions seem to suggest a massively long bonnet and short, pert tail. Classic GT styling, in other words.
We know that at the event on 5 December, Toyota will unveil both the road-going and racing versions of the GR GT, with Toyota president - and 24-karat car-nut - Akio Toyoda presiding.
That's two cars. You said three…
Oh yes, there's going to be a Lexus coupe too, a true successor to the legendary V10-engined LF-A. That will be revealed at the same event this week, and we can see from the darkened image supplied by Toyota that the Lexus version gets styling that's more futuristic, and which maybe has a touch of 1930s streamliner about it. It's likely to also draw heavy influence from the Lexus Sport Concept car (more on that here).
Will the Lexus version have a V8 too?
Possibly. Originally, it looked as if the Lexus coupe was going to be all-electric, with a Ferrari-shattering 0-100km/h time of just 2.0 seconds, but more recently, there have been rumours that the Lexus coupe will actually use a suitably modified version of the V8, which is in the GR GT. Or, possibly, Lexus will do both - a fully-electric version and a V8 version, to suit sir or madam's personal taste.
We'll find out in a couple of days, at 2pm Irish time.